


Mother Knows Best

by Longpig



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Cognitive Dissonance, Gen, Mother-Son Relationship, Sickfic, Whump, background zargar, bring the pain, dysfunctional space fam, gratuitous abuse of a fave, having an emotion is hard, no Zethrid not like that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2017-08-26
Packaged: 2018-12-20 07:28:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11916060
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Longpig/pseuds/Longpig
Summary: When Lotor falls mysteriously ill, there is one person his generals can think of who may be able to help... but will she?





	Mother Knows Best

Narti is the first to notice that something is amiss. The Prince’s scent is wrong, somehow. There’s a fevered sweetness to it that disturbs her, and when he brushes past to take his seat at the head of the table, she feels waves of heat coming off him. Kova’s eyes tell her that he is pale and drawn, with sweat glistening at his hairline. She growls deep in her chest, the sound too low for anyone but Kova to hear.

As the meeting begins, the others become concerned as well. She feels their discomfort like a tightness around her body as they shift uneasily in their seats. No-one wants to be the first to say something.

This is meant to be a strategy briefing to discuss Lotor’s plan to keep Voltron at bay while they work to locate another teludav fragment, but he seems to be having trouble concentrating. He loses his train of thought, and repeats questions he’s asked already. When he reaches out to take a data sheet from Acxa, his hand is shaking.

It’s Zethrid who finally breaks the tension. “Sir? Are you--is everything alright?”

“I’m _fine,_ ” he snaps, too forceful to be believable. It’s out of character, and Zethrid is taken aback. Narti feels her shrink a little. “Apologies, Zethrid,” he sighs. “It’s only a headache, but I’m afraid it’s worn my nerves quite thin. Perhaps it would be best to continue this later.” The others voice their assent. Narti clicks a claw uneasily against the arm of her chair. She is not convinced that anything is fine. The scent has grown positively cloying.

Lotor gathers up Acxa’s data sheets, preparing to leave. His breathing sounds laboured to Narti’s ears, but the others do not notice. “If there are any matters requiring my _immediate_ attention, I’ll be in my quarters.” He rises slowly from his seat, leaning on the table for support. She can feel his desperate need to escape. He is a proud man, and he doesn’t want them to see him like this, doesn’t want them to worry about him--

He hits the floor.

Acxa gets there first, kicking aside the data sheets scattered in her path. Narti hears her cry of dismay, and Ezor’s shocked gasp. Kova jumps down from her shoulder to give her a better view of what’s happening on the ground. Lotor’s eyes are fluttering half-open, rolled into the back of his head. His hands are balled into white-knuckled fists at his sides, and his body is wracked by convulsions that are painful to watch. Acxa kneels by his side, calling his name, but he doesn’t respond. Narti summons Kova back to her. She’s seen enough.

“What’s wrong with him?” Ezor wails, panicked. Acxa shakes her head, at a loss.

“What should we _do?_ ” Zethrid’s voice sounds smaller than should be possible. She’s more afraid now than she has been in any battle; Narti can smell it. They all are. Lotor is more than their commanding officer, or even their Prince. He’s the one who saved each of them and lifted them up to fight alongside him. He’s their hope for the future, their family, their friend.

Narti emits a series of loud clicks from her mandibles to catch the others’ attention, then signs: _the witch._ A grim understanding comes over Acxa’s features.

“But doesn’t he hate her?” Ezor protests. She doesn’t have a better idea though.

Narti shrugs. _Who else is there?_

“We have no choice,” Axca says flatly.

 _I will go,_ she signs _. Kova knows the way._

\-----

Haggar’s mind is reeling. Her _emotions_ , so long repressed and forgotten, threaten to storm out of control. Although it will take time before he is ready to resume the throne, Zarkon will recover. The _Empire_ will recover. Haggar is less certain about herself. _How could I have forgotten?_ she asks herself again and again. She struggles to reconcile these new _(old)_ memories with the past ten thousand years of experience. _Did you grieve for me for all those millennia, my love?_ Her husband’s hand is heavy in hers as he slumbers; no longer hovering between life and death, but only resting. They haven’t spoken since he first awakened, not really. She doesn’t know where to begin, but she can offer this touch, this small thing, at least.

The great doors to the Emperor’s chamber part to admit two of the komar. She doesn’t need to look to recognize them, nor to know why they are here. Her presence is required elsewhere. _How can anything be more important than this?_ She lets her fingers brush the back of his hand, and sighs inwardly. She knows that she must keep up the appearance of normalcy. Reluctantly, she lowers Zarkon’s hand to his breast, and turns towards her druids.

“Apologies,” the elder one offers, trailing behind her as she sweeps from the room. “One of your subjects has become more problematic. Operation Kuron--”

“I will see to it.” She cuts them off with a wave of her hand. “Stay with the Emperor. Send for me when”-- _no longer ‘if’--”_ he wakes. No-one is to be admitted.” As the door closes behind them, she glares into the shadows of the cavernous hall. She senses a presence, someone lurking there in the darkness. Her eyes narrow. “I know you’re there,” she states flatly. “Come out where I can see you.” A slim hooded figure with a long reptilian tail slips out of the darkness. Haggar frowns, and takes a step forward. “You’re one of Lotor’s girls.” _The telepath._ The alien bristles at the last word, letting out a low, guttural rattle. Haggar ignores it. Her gaze sweeps downwards to the lanky black creature at Narti’s heel. “And you have… my cat.” Kova arches his back and vibrates his tail, meowing loudly as he winds himself around her ankles, slipping in and out of her robes. Without thinking, she bends and scoops him into her arms. Narti seems nonplussed, and stands unmoving for a dobosh as Haggar strokes the fur at the back of Kova’s neck and listens to him purr.  She’s not even sure how long it has been since she held him last. “What do you want?” she asks finally, scowling at the other woman.

Narti flutters her hands quickly, speaking in sign. _The Prince is ill._ The silent words do something unexpected to her. A knot twists in her throat, more emotions she’s unprepared to deal with. She turns away.

“So call the medics.” Her words are clipped, intended as a dismissal, but she hesitates.

 _Please_ , Narti signs. Her empty face is devoid of expression, but her tail switches back and forth anxiously, whipping the air. Haggar’s hand stills on Kova’s back.

 _“How_ ill?” she sighs.

Narti steps towards her. Haggar feels her reach out, reach _through_ Kova and towards the edges of her own defenses. A flash of second-hand memory plays across her mind: Lotor collapsing to the ground, his generals gathering around him with stricken expressions as he convulses helpless on the floor. The newly awakened part of her screams that _this is her son_ , but she hardly knows him. Guilt burns her throat like bile. She remembers when she decided to create him, and how it was one of the projects to which Zarkon had more _reluctantly_ agreed. Now she knows why. _You must have hoped it would bring me back ._   _That we could be a family_ . No wonder then, that when Haggar was no more interested in her son than any of her other experiments, Zarkon had distanced himself from Lotor, even from the very beginning. How painful it must have been, for both of them. _My husband, my son; I am sorry._

Resentment boils up now, and anger toward Narti for forcing her to confront these thoughts. With a growl, she pushes back against the telepath, hard enough that she staggers, clutching at her temples.

“Stay away from my mind, _girl,_ ” Haggar growls. “You won’t like what you see.” She should count herself lucky that this is the only retaliation Haggar feels like dishing out.

Narti ducks her head once, and clicks nervously. _Please,_ she signs again. Kova shifts in Haggar’s arms, and meows again before hopping down to the floor. He looks back over his shoulder at her, twitching his tail.

“Very well,” she says finally. “Take me to him.”

Narti leads her to the Prince’s quarters, where the other Generals have moved him. Haggar has never been invited, and has never felt inclined to visit. There was no purpose in it.

She sees him now as if for the first time. His eyes are wild, glassy and unfocused. His hair, usually so meticulously groomed, is a sweaty mess, damp tendrils stuck haphazardly to his face. But he is _beautiful,_ and she feels an unfamiliar ache. She remembers watching him grow in the glass vessel that was his womb. She remembers the sullen, unhappy child, always wanting something from her that she didn’t have to give. The ache hardens into a hot, sharp blade, twisting in her chest. _Why couldn’t I have loved you?_ Perhaps everything would be different…

She tells herself that these maudlin thoughts are not _useful_ ; tries to brush them aside. The three women gathered around Lotor’s sickbed stare at her with a mixture of surprise, distrust and expectation. _They did not think I would come._ “Move aside,” she growls, and they do, although Axca stays close, hovering at her elbow. Haggar takes his chin in her hand, and turns his face toward her. His skin is alarmingly warm. He does not register her presence.

“...flush out the lions,” he mutters under his breath. His arm twitches; Haggar frowns.

“He’s been hallucinating,” Acxa says. She tries to keep her voice neutral, but there’s still a nervous edge to it.

“He thinks we’re back on Thaceryx,” Ezor adds. Her unease is more obvious. She fidgets constantly, crossing and uncrossing her arms, putting her hands on her hips, twitching her cephalic tendril. Haggar shoots her a withering glance and she clasps her hands behind her back instead; a small improvement.

Haggar presses two fingers to Lotor’s throat. His pulse is weak and rapid; but there’s something else that catches her attention -- dark red-purple blotches creeping up from beneath his collar. Her eyes narrow as she considers a possible cause, but she needs more information.

“He is overdressed,” she says without affect. “Get this armor off him.”

The four of them exchange uncomfortable glances. “Is that, uh… appropriate?” Zethrid ventures.

“Do you think he would rather it be the komar?” she snaps, impatient. “This fever will cook his brain if we do not lower his temperature.” There are no further objections. Acxa and Zethrid work quickly, stripping him to his shorts. As she suspected, the mottled rash is present under his arms as well as on his neck.

“What is wrong with him?” Acxa demands, unable to keep the edge from her voice.

“It’s _atarlon_.” It’s so ridiculous, she could almost laugh.

“What is that?” Zethrid snarls. “A poison? Did those Voltron cowards poison him?”

“An Altean childhood disease.” Most children experienced only a mild discomfort, and a few quintants’ respite from their schooling. “However… it can be quite serious in adults without an acquired immunity.” Focusing the role of the scientist, the clinician, allows her to step away from the discord that tears at her mind, at least for the moment. “How was he exposed?”

“We… encountered the Paladins, a movement ago,” Acxa admits. Haggar notes the omission of the circumstances of this ‘encounter’, but has no interest in pressing the matter. “The Altean Princess was among them.”

“But she wasn’t ill,” Zethrid protests.

“She could still be a carrier.” Some individuals, she recalls, could harbor the semi-dormant virus their whole lives, and show virtually no symptoms even during a relapse.

“...well played, Paladin,” Lotor mumbles.

“Is he going to die?” Ezor asks quietly.

“No.” _Not while I am here._ She may never be able to heal the rift between them, may never be able to be his mother; but she can do this much. Alfor’s issue will not claim victory this way. She summons the power within her that has claimed the last ten thousand years of her existence, and brushes her fingertips across the burning skin of his forehead. She will permit herself only the barest manipulation of his quintessence -- she does not wish to see him tainted as she is -- but it is enough. Lotor’s eyes flutter closed and he sighs deeply, sinking back into the bed. He will rest now, and his body will gather the strength to fight the infection.

Haggar’s hand drops to her side. She is tired now, and confused in a way that she hasn’t felt in millennia. She wants to be alone -- _no, not that, not again…_ She wants something absent so long she’s almost forgotten what it is. _Comfort?_ She is needed -- or needs to _be_ elsewhere. Her projects will wait. “I must go.”

\-----

Narti slips out a dobash after the witch, trailing in the shadows. Her distinctive scent is easily tracked -- unfamiliar herbs and strange chemistry, burnt things and blood. She isn’t fully certain of why she has followed Haggar; but she feels that she should. Someone should say something; acknowledge what she has done. The irony that it should fall to the voiceless Narti is not lost on her.

“Still trying to sneak up on me?” Haggar stills her stride. There is a soft rustle of cloth, and Narti senses those sharp, burning eyes settle on her, searching her out in the darkness. She feels exposed, vulnerable; she wonders, briefly, if this is how most people feel around her.

Narti shakes her head, twitching her clawed fingers as she tries to think of what to say. Haggar is not what she expected. She is formidable, of course; power radiates from her in heady pulses that assault Narti’s heightened senses. But there is an imbalance, a disturbance that swirls beneath the dispassionate facade. She had a fleeting impression earlier, when she had brushed so recklessly against the ramparts of Haggar’s mind, of sadness, anger and regret… Not emotions she would have thought to associate with such a figure. _Thank you,_ she signs at last.

“It was a trivial manipulation of quintessence,” she growls disdainfully. “Just make sure he doesn’t do anything foolish until he recovers fully.”

 _Should we tell him you were here?_ Her throat-rattle pitches upward, questioning.

“Tell him what you want; it makes no difference to me.” The lie is obvious, which is surprising in itself.

Narti hesitates a tick. _What if he asks for you?_

“He won’t.” Her voice stings with bitterness. When Narti hears the whisper of her robes again, she knows better than to follow any further.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Come and flail with me on [Tumblr!](http://lotors-saltwife.tumblr.com)


End file.
